James 3:5-10: My Reminder
And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be.

To answer teh original question: I was another young pup that got introduced to the BattleTech Universe through MW2 in the mid 90s, in the late 90’s my older brother picked me up a copy of the BattleTech Fourth Edition boxed set. I also find the clan society structure and ethics to be fascinating.
In Classic BattleTech ton for ton it is imbalanced in the clan’s favor since most of the Clan weapons take up less space and tonnage produce less heat and have a further range, and that is not to mention the greater efficiency of the other subsystems. But if you try and match forces via Battle Values you will have a closely balanced game. Now if you use the rules given in the Solaris VII boxed set and Solaris The Reaches rulebook you can see an imbalance that is insane, In Solaris VII rules you not only have the clan weapons and subsystems taking up less space and weight, but they are reloading/recharging in about half the time too. However in Solaris VII they seem to give both Clan and IS weapons the same heat values , I can only assume they have changed these values to help balance game play.

Most of the younger players like myself have been introduced to the BattleTech Universe with the Clan presences in existence, so we are much more willing and open to accept the concept of Clans and their technological advantages. And I can see ware fair number of the older players that started playing the BattleTech board games and RPGs since the mid to late 80’s and grew up on the concept of the Inner Sphere’s technology and systems did not like the radical changes to the BattleTech Universe that the Clans brought with them. The BattleTech board game has been around since 1985 (actually 1984 with original BattleDroids game), the MechWarrior RPG was released around 1986, and the Clans did not come into the games until about 1990 for BattleTech and 1991 for the MWRPG, however think I have seen the Clans mentioned in sourcebooks printed as early as 1988.
And to me growing up with the Clans the Dark Ages storyline and beyond brings sad changes to the Clans as well as some changes to the Inner Sphere that I do not care for. For the most of us liking the Clans or the storyline erra greatly reflects upon what we grew up with.

As to Riddick’s mention of the MW2 video: I often wondered that myself, from I know there is no sub-faction (Galaxy Cluster ect.) that Clan Wolf or Clan Jade Falcon has that looks like that. However MW2:31CC takes place after Tukyyid, it is about Clan Wolf and Clan Jade Falcon doing their Crusader and Warden bickering, according to the sourcebooks the events in the game would be taking place around 3057 so it would be feasible at this time for the Inner Sphere to have their hands on a few clan mechs.
If memory serves me right one of these mech pilots identified himself as “Robo Cadet”, according to the Wolf Clan Sourcebook as a cadet in Clan Wolf you are not allowed to display the clan’s insignia on your uniform, I would assume this would hold true to the equipment that a cadet would be operating. Perhaps there is a training insignia that was rarely mentioned.
Another fact from the sourcebooks freeborn warriors often openly show radical protest against the clan government looking down upon and discouraging freeborn from becoming warriors, they do this by tattoos choice of clothing and similar acts of expression. However this theory is ruled out since the game tends to portray you as a Trueborn.
As far as I know the shown insignia is not from the InnerSphere or Periphery either, it looks like Activision had a little fun doing some creativity with the intro movie.

Another goof by Activision is the Timberwolf shown on the game box, it has an insignia on its left leg that has a red circle with blue on the inside and yellow lettering “4th” with a blade having blood on it. This appears to be a similar insignia (as well as similar to the insignias discription) to the Trinary Command of the 4th Striker Cluster in the Delta Galaxy (this information can be found in the Wolf Clan sourcebook pg.103), There are no mech pilots listed in the 4th Striker Cluster piloting a Timberwolf they seem to be mostly Fenris and Pumas there are a couple Phantoms and one Gargoyle.
There also is the 4th Wolf Guards Cluster in the Delta Galaxy but none of the insignia descriptions depict in detail of the insignia shown on the box as the 4th Striker Cluster did, however they do have several TimberWolfs listed.
I am not seeing any information on the “05” that is listed on the torso the right leg and the left missile box of the mech, I am guessing it is dealing with the Point ranking within the Trinary.
And the Clan Wolf insignia the wolf’s head is facing left when it should be facing to the right.